Washington (CNN) - The House of Representatives Tuesday passed a GOP-sponsored bill banning so- called "late term abortions" - procedures for women who are beyond 20 weeks into their pregnancy. The vote was 228-196, mostly along party lines.

The bill’s sponsor, Republican Rep. Trent Franks, R-Arizona, stirred up controversy last week when he opposed an effort by House Democrats to add an exception for women who are raped, arguing that "the incidents of rape resulting in pregnancy are very low."

House Democrats seized on the comment, and because of the backlash GOP leaders later decided to add new language to the bill allowing women who get pregnant as a result of rape or incest to obtain an abortion if they report the crime to authorities.

The White House has threatened a veto on the legislation, but the Democratic-led Senate is not expected to take up the measure.

soundoff(276 Responses)

Once again the Republican congress wasting taxpayers time and dollars passing useless and illegal legislation and not doing any real work. Just more pandering to the American Taliban errr Christians.

June 19, 2013 08:16 am at 8:16 am |

Primewonk

From 2000 to 2006 these fundíot nutters had the perfect storm. They owned the White House, Senate, House, and Supreme Court. Yet, they did nothing.

Let's see if the fundy nutters can figure out why.

June 19, 2013 08:21 am at 8:21 am |

blackhawkmom

Nothing better to do I guess.

June 19, 2013 08:21 am at 8:21 am |

Mrc

I really wish the republicans would worry as much about getting pretty much anything else done in Washington as they do about the individual rights of certain groups of people in the United States. If it involves women's bodies, same sex relationships, or minorities, they are right on it though!

June 19, 2013 08:25 am at 8:25 am |

Wake up People!

But yet and still no jobs bill.......

June 19, 2013 08:26 am at 8:26 am |

RandyIA

Now the fun begins. The left who keeps saying the right in the house never does anything has done something. It will be fun to see them now complain that they have voted for legislation that will go nowhere. The same as what the senate does but the left blames the house for not supporting it. Gotta love the spin.

June 19, 2013 08:27 am at 8:27 am |

TomInRochNY

Hey, Boehner, where are the JOBS, JOBS, JOBS?

June 19, 2013 08:27 am at 8:27 am |

blackhawkmom

Instead of focusing on women how about you try doing something about the men. Ban s-e-x outside of marriage – see how men would like that.

June 19, 2013 08:32 am at 8:32 am |

The Real Tom Paine

Sigh. Another worthless symbolic vote that attempts to give the illusion the House is a serious deliberative body. There are so many other things that could pass through the House and get signed into law: why won't they tackle them? Why is every exercise by both parties nothing more than posturing? In salary alone, we pay Congress almost 100 million dollars a year, and for what? Legislation that has no chance of making it to the Upper Chamber, much less being signed into law? Its a sad indictment of how broken the system is.

June 19, 2013 08:44 am at 8:44 am |

Derek

I'm a libertarian, so I'm pro-choice, but democrats really are hypocrites. They want to ban guns to "save children" yet they have no problems with the slaughter of over 300,000 fetuses per year. Explain that.

June 19, 2013 08:45 am at 8:45 am |

laquiesha bailey

i dont believe in abortions so i think they made an great choice and half of the time its not the child's fault because their parent(s) make them keep the baby which they dont want to and half of the time the parent(s) want them to keep the baby which they dont want to even i would never choose abortion for myself i think that abortions should be open if not we are going to deal with higher chances of unfit parents, abuse, rape, children that run away because their parent did not want them but only had them because that was the law and most girls doesnt find out until they are over 20 weeks so i think that is kind of mean although abortions are wrong it would be a better place if the state would start letting us do what we want with our OWN BODIES!YOU GUYS ARE THE GOVERNMENT NOT GOD! AND I FEEL LIKE SOME GIRLS ARE BETTER OFF DOING AN ABORTION BECAUSE IF THEY KEEP THE BABY THERES A POSSIBILITY THAT THEY ARE GOING TO KILL THE CHILL LATER ON IN OR ITS GOING TO BE A HIGHER RISK OF TEEN SUICIDES SO LEAVE IT BE!

June 19, 2013 08:48 am at 8:48 am |

snowboarder

meaningless. it is going nowhere.

June 19, 2013 08:50 am at 8:50 am |

joetunon

Look at pictures of developing fetuses and tell me we're not killing ourselves before we're even born. I don't care what your religious or political affiliations are. This is a human issue. And we're killing ourselves.

June 19, 2013 08:57 am at 8:57 am |

gladiatorgrl

this is ALL the GOP is good for – trying to overturn Roe

June 19, 2013 08:58 am at 8:58 am |

Charles

What a waste of time.

June 19, 2013 08:59 am at 8:59 am |

Wayne Vandergraff

Dumb. Really, really dumb.

June 19, 2013 09:01 am at 9:01 am |

Vince

What a waste of time.

June 19, 2013 09:14 am at 9:14 am |

mk045

Excellent. Now my chances of getting a better, higher-paying job are much, much higher. Or, not...

GOP – doing irrelevant things is not "trickle down economics".

June 19, 2013 09:16 am at 9:16 am |

Jim

The GOP will just keep redefining "Late Term" until it means "immediately after intercourse".

June 19, 2013 09:17 am at 9:17 am |

Howard

Once again, the Tea Bagger-controlled Republican House uses their salaried time, paid for by the texpayers, to make another pointless ideological statement instead of compromising with the Democrats to work out solutions to some of the pressing public issues of our time.

These clowns are as useless as tits on a bull.

June 19, 2013 09:20 am at 9:20 am |

aaron

I'm a moderate conservative and a Christian: this legislation was a complete waste of time and effort by congress.

June 19, 2013 09:21 am at 9:21 am |

WHY?!!

what kind of people have time to go to pro life protests? nutjobs and crazy people

June 19, 2013 09:22 am at 9:22 am |

Phyllis Gwendoline Williams

Everyone should realize that Abortion is Murder (Jeremiah 1: 5) and repentance is necessary for those who have
done it (Romans 3: 23 ; Ezekiel 3: 21).

June 19, 2013 09:24 am at 9:24 am |

James PDX

Except in very extreme cases, 20 weeks is plenty of time to decide if you want an abortion. As liberal as I am, I have no problem with that part of this bill. Pro-choicers can have their choice, they just need to make it within 20 weeks of conception and before the fetus matures enough to experience the pain of being destroyed. That's not too much of a compromise to ask.

June 19, 2013 09:25 am at 9:25 am |

BCW

GOP teabaggers did not learn from the last election a bit.
Why GOP men are so interested in taking away women's rights?
Please vote them out in 2014 so that the country can move forwar. Hillary for 2016 !!